Undergraduate credential earners fell by 1.6% in the 2021-2022 academic year, a loss of 58,800 students, according to a new report from the National Student Clearinghouse Research Center. That’s the lowest level seen in four years and the first time the share of credential earners has declined in a decade. Most of the drop stemmed from an unprecedented loss of first-time graduates, according to the clearinghouse. The drop of 1.9%, about 50,700 students, represented the largest single-year decline since the clearinghouse began collecting the data in 2012.
